From Paper Leaks to Class Struggle: A Marxist Critique of the Student Movement

Sonam wangchuk and the ongoing liberal movement in India

"What can you do, when one thousand policemen come and surround a forest village? Do you go on a hunger strike? The Gandhian ethos is a very frightening ethos in the forest. Because the performance of Gandhian ethos requires an audience. In the forest, there's no audience. In a society that doesn't belong to the rest of the society, how do hungry people go on a hunger strike? How do people not have any money not pay taxes or do civil disobedience? No one cares, no one's watching."

- Arundhati Roy.

On 18th July, 2026, Delhi police forcefully admitted Sonam wangchuk, an engineer and educator from Ladakh into a government hospital. Mr. Sonam had started his indefinite fast in support of the CJP’s (Cockroach Janata Party) demand for the resignation of the Indian Education Minister, Dharmendra Pradhan. The utter incompetence demonstrated by the NTA (National Testing Agency) and the Education ministry, in holding one of the most important examination of the country, that decides the fate of millions of students, is spectacular and more astonishing is the audacity to remain absolutely indifferent to the entire fiasco created by themselves. The paper leak of NEET (National Eligibility cum Entrance Test), inconsistencies in CBSE class 12th results are just the surface level flaws of the Education ministry that have sparked the ongoing protests across various places of the country. The education system of a country with a population of 1.47 billion and poverty like no other should be designed to ensure that the masses could have access to it at a reasonable rate, but on the contrary what we see is hundreds and thousands of public schools across the country are shut down (in Uttar Pradesh alone 25,126 schools have been shut since 2014-2020). This systemic paralysation of education and disenfranchisement of millions of poverty stricken people of the country is done with the sole purpose of reducing the upward mobility of a growing middle class, since the economy is unable to provide jobs for them. So neither do these middle class get educated, nor they ask for jobs in future, problem solved. Wah Modiji what a brilliant solution to such a complex problem! One might ask that why has there been no resistance or any discussion for that matter regarding this in any public forum, the answer to that lies in the very nature of the Indian state, which is plagued by the opium of religion upon which the millions of workers, job seekers and the youth are intoxicated. Alongside a media which basically serves as the puppet of the state and workers unions choked at the throat, we have the perfect recipe for a fascist regime to carry out its propaganda without any form of real resistance.

With the suicide of atleast 32 students in a single year over the NEET paper leak sparked a massive reaction across the country. The CJP, formed as a joke, in reaction to the Chief Justice’s disgusting comment on the youth, fueled the petty bourgeoisie anger onto this protest against the “system”. The fascist regime has finally, after destroying the workers and peasants of the country, knocked at the doors of the petty bourgeioisie, and unhappy with this intervention in their daily lives, they have taken to the streets in retaliation and with the hopes that they will revive the conditions to their favour.

“Sonam Wangchuk can end his fast if political leaders meet him and assure to raise issue of accountability and education in Monsoon Session,” said Sonam Wangchuks wife Gitanjali J Angmo on 19th July, 2026. It is crucial to understand that the liberal movement that has been launched across the country aims only at restoration of bourgeiosie democracy to its prior “form”. This form, that the masses expect to revert back to, has a few key illusions, one of them is the illusion of accountability, that the state holds itself accountable of any wrongdoing, at times a public show is made of a corrupt minister or corrupt official stripped of their respectable status in response to public pressure, but todays’ reality is the regime simply cannot accept defeat at any point, any show of weakness will destruct the house of cards it has built to maintain the hegemony in this feeble economy. Which is why, the proposed “Chalo sansad” protest march of the CJP on 20th is met by the lathicharge of Delhi police in lieu of prohibitory orders under section 163, barring any marches, processions and assemblies of five or more people across the New Delhi district.

Unless the petty bourgeoisie realises that the illusory mask of safety and security it made itself comfortable with in the preceding years has been taken off, and joins the struggles of the working class hand-in-hand in urban and rural areas, a true emancipatory struggle cannot be unleashed. The faith that the current judiciary will take steps to ensure justice will be done where it is due, will soon be broken again as it has been in the past. Justice in a class society does not precede the interests of the ruling class, any contradiction between the two is resolved in the most earliest to ensure a smooth operation of the state machinery.

Anand teltumbde in an article explains the Gandhian Politics of the current liberal movement in the following manner, “The efficacy of Gandhian satyagraha has perhaps been romanticized by both its admirers and its critics. Whether fasting and voluntary suffering possess any intrinsic capacity to compel political change is doubtful. Unlike a strike, a fast halts no production. Unlike a boycott, it imposes no economic cost. Unlike civil disobedience, it need not obstruct the functioning of the state. By itself, a fast exerts no coercive pressure. Its force lies entirely in moral persuasion.

But moral persuasion is not an abstract ethical principle; it is a political relationship. It becomes effective only when the voluntary suffering of the protester generates wider public sympathy, transforms that sympathy into collective action, and ultimately imposes political costs upon those in power. A fast, therefore, is not itself an instrument of political pressure. It is merely a catalyst that may create the conditions under which such pressure can emerge.”

That is a true analysis of the Gandhian satyagraha, unless it can convince the masses to jump into action, the mere act of peacefully fasting doesn’t have a real political impact and will only remain as an act of self-martyrdom. Nothing can replace collective, conscious political organisation. Without a genuine ideological vanguard to lead these liberal movements, they are unlikely to achieve anything of lasting significance in the current era. It is not to say that these movements must be abhorred or deserted, but rather the collective consciousness of the masses must be raised through repeated indication of the true nature of the state. The brutal assault on peaceful protesters is not an aberration, nor is it an unfortunate failure of the state. Rather, it reflects the very logic by which the state is organised: to suppress dissent whenever it threatens or disrupts established political and economic power.

Multiple instances of fasting as a political strategy, has been seen across the country ever since independence, but the crucial thing to understand here is that not all political strategy is suited for every situation. One must decide the course of action based on the political circumstances around them, guided by the ultimate goal of labour emancipation, of which all other struggles are a part of.

To fight for your demands and what is rightfully yours is not a negotiable it is the only way by which the toiling classes have achieved anything. The sycophant and corrupt managements of Educational institutes across the country, from IITs to Universities like JNU, DU have all issued notices threatening students of “legal action” upon participation in these mass demonstrations. The true nature of every instituition or group or party is revealed whenever these burning issues resulting from the class contradictions appear in the society. The demands and actions of them reveal who they truly serve. “In a society torn between class antagonisms, there can never be an above-class or non-class ideology” ~ Lenin, 1902

The strategy and demands of the liberal movement:

The ongoing movement across the country, has as its key demand, the resignation of the Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan. The youth of the country, led by the liberal masses has determined to undertake this task to the end, and have begun their march towards the Sansad (Parliament) despite the brutal attack by the State police and armed forces. As history has shown, and also lenin argues in his article “What is to be Done (1902)”, the working class, by exclusively its own efforts can only raise itself to trade union conciousness. Along similar line, the spotaneous movement of the liberal intelligentsia and youth of the country can only raise itself to the demands of reformism. Sonam Wangchuk has written a letter from his Hospital bed that he will continue the fast until either the youth leaders or himself are visited and given verbal assurance by the ministers that they will raise their “concerns” inside the Parliament only goes on to prove our point. At the face of the police brutality witnessed by the protesting youth, the leadership can only extend their demand to “requesting” the very people who caused those specific “concerns” i.e death of multiple students and harassment of millions more, to look after their demands. The resignation of the education minister reaps no fruit as long as the system that makes all of this brutality and injustice happen remains unchanged.

As of writing this article Sonam Wangchuk has broken his fast on 24th July after meeting with Union Ministers and other lackeys of the State after they assured him saying “The government is positive about not registering cases against those protesting peacefully at Jantar Mantar in Delhi and those participating in the march to the Parliament on July 20, 2026. The government has already assured its discussions to find solutions to paper leaks and educational reforms for exams in the Parliament. Besides, the government is also positively considering suitable compensation for the suicide victims of recent NEET paper leaks.” These empty promises pretty much fell down the moment liberal CJP called off the protest without paying any heed to the state repression students are facing all over the country. Banking on the verbal assurance of fascist state, liberals again showed the glaring inconsistencies in their performance as they celebrated the replacement of Dharmendra Pradhan with long term RSS member and staunch supporter of Bilkis Bano rapists Prahlad Joshi while police brutality continue. In bihar alone, over 150 students and protesters were detained following the 25th july Bihar Bandh, with reports of AK 47 being fired at the protesters. The nationwide instances of Procedural violations, police kidnappings of activists and supporters extends to West Bengal, where the modern equivalent of the colonial style “police state ” law aka Goonda Daman Act has been invoked for the first time on the student-youth protesters. 16 people have been arrested, most of whom are long term left wing activists branding them as outside "troublemakers" who infiltrated the rally to assault police officers and media personnel. These targeted arrests particularly from local minority neighborhoods shows the state’s intention about using this draconian act. With Goonda Daman Act State can arrest any dissenters under the legal conundrum of “Preventive Detention”, strip away Due Process & Right to Counsel and make any opposition rot in jail for up to 12 months without trial or formal charges. But of no surprise the sycophant CJP has yet again backstabbed the protestors and officially disavowed them as outsiders/poitical plants brought in to disrupt the seemingly peaceful protest. Now it is our duty as conscious members of the student-youth movement to spurn the liberal betrayors and turn towards vigilant class struggle. The people have heard and believed in empty words for long enough to identify the blatant trial to stop the movement from creating a organised multi-headed opposition with a collaboration of the workers, peasants and minorities against the fascist regime.

Learning from the Farmers Protests

We must remember from the recent past the struggle the farmer unions of the country had to wage for more than almost a year to get the reactionary pro-capitalist farmer laws repealed. All liberal pro-capitalist parties including the INC, etc who are anti-worker and anti-farmer to the core, stayed away from the protests for a long time, and it was not until the protest had garnered support of the masses across the country and abroad that they stepped in meekly chanting hollow slogans against the ruling party.

On 29th september representatives from 31 farmer organisations met with the then CM of Punjab, Amarinder Singh, who had nothing to offer but un-assuring promises of taking up the matter to Supreme Court. But leadership of the peasant and working class cannot be befooled so easily, they are not swayed away by liberal slogans and compromises at every stage, they have the tenacity to carry out the struggle to the end under their democratically elected leadership of various revolutionary organs. Hence the farmers decided to escalate their struggle starting from October of that year, under the banner of AIKSCC which decided to reject all offers of talks with the government unless the bills were withdrawn.

It was not the first time the farmers had protested, over the past decade multiple protests were waged by the farmers on issues of loan waivers, higher MSP’s, protection from market liberalisation, land acquisition and privatisation. In 2019, against the governments proposal of lowering import duties on agricultural products, that would fill the market with foreign products destroying the livelihood of millions of domestic producers. In 2018 against the Rajasthan govt led by INC, against the mounting indebtness the small and mediocre farmers were facing. With increasing privatisation, loan-sharking, hiked fuel prices and exorbitant costs of living, the majority of small farmers (owning less than 2 hectares of Land, approximately 86% of the country) were barely making a living. The failure of the isolated struggles made the farmers realise that only a well coordinated, large scale protest across the country can force the government to even take into consideration the demands of the farmers. What followed was series of strikes and blockades of railways and highways that finally caused a disruption in the ruling classes seamless exploitative profiteering that forced the government to take the farmers seriously.

Although the conciousness of the farmers across the country has not reached the stage where they would revolt against the system, they sure are at a better position and are organised through repeated struggles waged by them mostly because of the general decline of farmers’ living conditions under the rotten capitalist system which cannot guarantee a decent living, proper remuneration for their produce and, above all, control over their land and produce. Moreover to succeed in their aims, they must identify the black sheep amongst them, the petty bourgeois middlemen, corrupt union leaders and careerists that will hold them back at every stage and later opportunistically sell the whole movement out.

Similarly the students and youth of the country must also take notes and learn from the struggles of the working class and peasantry of the country. They must not at any stage let the dalals of the system sell them out short and the only way they can prevent that is by standing up in solidarity with the struggles that are being waged by the workers and progressive sects throughout the country and connecting them with their own. This capitalist society offers no relief at any stage for the toiling. A student today is going to be part of the workforce tomorrow, which necessitates the need for socialist education and a truer understanding of the class forces of ones own country and their role in it.

Only through active indulgence with these movements and socialist currents can the youth teach themselves the skill of organising and becoming a revolutionary for real. They must take lessons from the past so that they can make the right choices in crucial times like these. As lenin teaches us in his article “What is to be done” there are only two situations for a revolutionary during an ongoing mass movement: one is they simply mirror the existing demands of the masses, limiting themselves to what the masses are already doing or else they recognize that the mass struggles create new opportunities and therefore require concious organisation, political education and strategy, and he argues against the tailism of the first approach. Conscious political intervention does not oppose historical development, it enables it.

The liberals, pseudo-leftists like the CPI(M), will desert the movement as soon as it takes a revolutionary turn. Despite multiple students and members of the SFI (Student federation of India) participating in these movement being beaten up by the police, the only MLA of the CPI(M) from West Bengal joined hands with the BJP MLA’s rally against the protests, the party also issued statements “condemning” the retaliation of the masses when they were faced with brutal police violence, fascist mobs and their bootlicking media personnel. The opportunism of these parties shines brightly, and the people of the country, the students and workers watching it unfold right in front of them must make a vow to not let these elements take hold of the movements leadership.

Critique OnThe Anti Paper Leak Bill

The much-touted Anti Paper Leak Bill, too, is yet another instance of the liberal illusion that the crisis of bourgeois social relations can be solved through enhanced punitive measures. As in all such reactionary laws, the Anti Paper Leak Bill is designed to exact exemplary punishment on individuals while leaving the structural causes untouched. The report of the Radhakrishnan Committee itself revealed the rot at the core of the examination system and recommended that comprehensive institutional and technological measures be taken to ensure that such malfunctions never took place again. By choosing to deal with the issue in a narrow, repressive legalistic framework, the government fails to acknowledge the root causes of the problem. The government should have responded to the crisis by dismantling the very system that produces such malfunctions. Even when the law does take action, the people are made to wait interminably in long queues before any justice can be dispensed. In this manner, the very idea of speedy trials and justice is a bourgeois ploy which serves to undermine popular confidence in the law, particularly when the popular masses are perpetually in the dock. Thus, the Paper Leak Bill protects the system; it protects the existing order.

The future of the movement : what lies ahead for us

The future of the movement will be determined by the resolution of the key contradiction right now between the agitated mass and its incomepetent and infantile leadership i.e the CJP, and the parliamentary parties together with them in opposition. On 25th July, the key demand of the liberals, resignation of the Education Minister, was fulfilled after weeks long protests, multiple injuries the resilient masses have achieved their demands for now. Despite the joy all around we must remember the struggle that the masses had to put up because the battle does not end here, this is only the begining and it only stops when the country is liberated from the shackles of the Fascist regime and power is in the hands of the working class. The struggles that the students and youth of the country waged through and through should be a starting for all the oppressed masses, from the trans-queer people, to the adivasis, to the dalits, to all the religious and other persecuted minorities in this country, its your time to rise in rage and put an end to this suffering.

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